That damned envelope shows up, informing you that you must Serve Your Country. No, not a draft notice, the other one; Jury Duty. This might not seem so bad…you get to decide someone’s fate and maybe read newspapers with holes cut in them…but the government has conveniently “forgotten” to link what they pay you to inflation, so that you’re getting the same four cents per day (to make up for your lost work) as ancient Roman citizens got when Caesar was still in his bronze diapers.

But if you try to ditch jury duty, you have to face twin hurdles:

You will be a “bad citizen”, as the whole fabric of society depends on trial by jury…

And, far more important, if you try to skip out they’ll reinstate capital punishment for jury evaders, or at least drag you into court and fine you or something.

So you have to come up with a really “compelling reason” why you can’t serve, despite your honest desire (cough) to live up to your civic duties.

Unfortunately, the courts will often reject even truly valid reasons, so the ones you’re making up right now are even less likely to save your butt.

But tremble in fear no longer, a solution is at hand!

Simply Be Honest

All you have to do is admit to the court that you know the powers you would have as a juror.

See, the courts weren’t really in on the whole “Constitutional Convention” thing, and ever since 1787 they’ve been bending over backwards to weed out troublemakers who insist on sticking to some of the rights protected back then.

No, not the gun nonsense. Not that free speech silliness. Nothing about income taxes being only for federal employees, or who gets to have abortions.

Judges play games with the law: they can't change jury powers, but they can keep people who know about it from becoming jurors

What really pisses off judges and lawyers is that whole “Juries have the power to decide the law” thing.

See, the guys who set up the whole US Government decided to include Common Law in the court system. This includes the power of a jury to decide that the defendant did indeed break the law, but that the jury doesn’t approve of the law.

So the defendant is not guilty by reason of the law sucking, essentially.

Can you think of any laws like that?

If you’re like me (sorry, didn’t mean to be insulting), you can probably think of more crappy laws than poop-free ones.

You Are Free from Jury Duty

But they do refuse to let anyone who knows about this power serve on a jury.

Nice loophole for the power-hungry courts, eh?

But their little scam is YOUR salvation.

All you have to do is tell them you know about your right to toss out bad laws, and they will decide you can’t serve, just as if you knew too much about the case, or were eleven months pregnant.

When they’re screening you, and they get to the question

“Will you follow the law as given, even if you disagree with it?”,

or any kind of question about “Jury Nullification” (the power you have to toss out…nullify…a law), or when they ask you if there’s any reason you shouldn’t serve, you simply tell the judge you know your rights as a juror, that you can reject any sucky law even if the judge instructs you not to. Don’t worry, no matter how annoyed he looks, the judge will simply release you from jury duty, to go back home to your family and job or whatever.

YOU are a hero, because you’ve struck a blow against their little evasion of freedom and justice…and yet you’re also FREE FROM JURY DUTY!

Ive had judges happy to accpt anecdotal evidence, and reject real evidence which destroyed my case I was the respondant. if im ever asked to be a juror there is no way ill ever convict a person who committed a victimless crime, or convict a person that defends themselves/and or thier family they are laws I dissagree with.

because I have such strong views I will likely never be selected for a jury.

Remembering the jury trial from the Oscar winning movie 12 Angry men when the murder trial of Pistorius ends, fate being decided by the judge and two court officials just because of the jury being banned in South Africa in 1969.

I agree.
That’s why I have always despised Southern Whites. They are the welfare and SSI bottom feeding parasites that our hard earned tax dollars go to. And it’s these Red-Neck lumps of dreck who lie about how Blacks & Hispanics are the ones sucking up all the benefits.

Well shit. I ain’t never seen such racism and disrespect. Any of us true rednecks know to be respectful. And the reason we’re all on welfare is because people like you won’t give us no jobs. The only time we get mad at others for suckin up the benefits is when they are here illegally and even so, if they are workin as hard as we are, we couldnt really give two sticks about it.

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I researched many hours on this issue and this author has it correct.
In 1776 jury duty was a civic honor. In 2013 it is an annoying obligation to be used by a corrupt court system in which both sides abuse the power of a jury to spin wrong into right. I intend on using Jury nullification as well as having the attitude of all defendants are guilty.
You simply cannot make someone objective. Period.

Regarding a jury trial by either side I will never, and I mean NEVER be convinced that by confusing the truth by an attorney the defendant is innocent. That is my right and I will hold to that. PERIOD!
After researching this topic it is about time that the media was involved. I also noticed that our corrupt legal system posts many sites that either shame you into such duty or threaten all types of punishment. This is how desparate they have become.
To those morons including the lawyers who try and spin bull to we, the intelligent. Good luck. People are not that stupid anymore.

But that is the VERY reason you should serve as a juror. Have you ever served? If not, you should so that you can see how the actual cases are tried and not just imagine how it happens. You are only imagining what actually goes on in the trial. As a juror it is your duty and obligation to ONLY listen to the actual evidence in the case, not the lawyers “theories” anything a lawyer says is not evidence, they only present it and try to throw in theories (NOT evidence)… jurors use common sense when hashing out the evidence with the other jurors and then decide (this happens away from any lawyer or judge). I am not a lawyer, I am not a judge, but, I just served as a juror and the instructions by the Judge to the jurors were that we should only listen to the actual evidence and that anything restated by lawyers etc IS NOT EVIDENCE! He basically told us to barely listen to the lawyers. And guess what? Every single juror did just that, we knew exactly what was spin and bull. Because we basic citizens have a lot of intelligence, just like you said, none of us want to hear bull, when you get in there and hear a case you want to make the right decision!! So, if a smart person like you avoids jury duty, and no one volunteers, you will be having lawyers spinning and no one to put them in check…. just some food for thought. I have to say I was happy when all of us jurors were all by ourselves and we could say to each other, “did you hear that lawyer’s theory! HA he thinks we are sheep :) ” Anyway, it is everybody’s chance to get in there and see what is good what is bad, I must say it was a good experience for me.

I refuse to be report for jury duty as an objector of the whole jacked up phony lying system set up to coddle the white collar criminals and throw the poor in jail. My state, Texas, has prisons for profit which I consider an abomination to God and the people he created. I am suppose to be in court to report for jury duty this coming Monday and I will proudly be a no show. If you try the civic duty crap on me you’ll get an earful of why you should not support this evil system. God makes it clear to fear God and not man, so I refuse to be afraid of going to jail for the no show. I am 57 years old, have no record, and any judge that wants to toss me in the slammer for contempt will be reported on you tube with his name splattered all over with “Catholic Grandma thrown in jail for refusing to support a system that has prisons for profit” as the names of the booking officer and the arresting officer will be openly exposed also. Then I will go over to the that slimy ACLU and tell them my story and let them know that it is I who hold THEM, the courts, and ALL who support it in complete contempt and I would rather go to jail then face God and say I was to cowardly to stand up for what was in my heart and soul. If I suffer the repercussions for that then I will ask my God to deal with ‘them’. He will. Judges, cops, DA’s, attorneys, jurors, prison guards, and all the way to janitors in the prison are vile to me for they could care less that some chumps out there are making money for shareholders of the prisons. They don’t care as long as they get their paychecks. Now that is sick sick sick. And Robert, you make me sick sick sick for you would rather suck up to the system and call it your duty than fight the evil in it. So, throw this Grandma in jail, the whole world will know it when I get released. The whole world…

The best thing you can do if called to Jury Duty is to not let the judge know that you know about Jury Nullification. If I served on a trial in which either marijuana possession or prostitution (among consenting adults), I would exercise it in a heartbeat. As far as being bound by oath, jurors, a) jurors should not have to take an oath because jurors are made up of WE, THE PEOPLE, and b) who will the judge suspect which juror convinced the rest of the jury of exercising J/N? And if the judge has a listening device in the Deliberation Room, then shame on the judge because he/she is violating the law..

Remember God says submit to authority. . .So (in my opinion) to reject legitimate authority (that is an authority that doesn’t oppose God’s authority) might land you in hot water (not just with the legal system but also with God Himself). Personally not interested in jury duty either but if you tell the truth and they (the court system) rejects you for it, in this case, so much the better! However, I’m not going to come down on someone that is interested in the process and wants to serve (rock on!). It would seem to make more sense instead of them sending out blast letters forcing you to come in- they would just ask who would be interested in jury duty and allow you to mail back a reply- hopefully you get people like Steve and rejection replies from people like me. They get their jury and I get to go to work! That’s just my two cents.

God doesn’t say to submit to authority. Sure, in corrupt, politically motivated translations of the Bible, there is a false impression of this, but in reality there is nothing Jesus does or says in the four Gospels that is anything but anti-authority.

The same is true of other supposedly authoritarian passages in the Bible. For example, when the Pharisees ask Jesus about Caesar’s gold and taxes, they do this specifically because Jesus is against paying taxes to Rome. They are trying to trap him into opposing paying taxes, which would have let them turn him over to Rome as a lawbreaker. He evades the question, by saying to give Caesar what is his…because he is rejecting both Rome’s gold (which the corrupt Pharisees depended on for their sort of Vishy State rule over the region) and Rome’s taxes, while not technically saying anything illegal.

I feel jury duty is a civic responsibility, like voting, and even if it weren’t mandatory I’d attempt to engage in it of my own free will. However, If it was voluntary, then I’d probably have to use my vacation time to attend it (what employer is going to put up with people skipping work just because they feel like it?). It isn’t right for the government to force a company to allow me to skip work, etc, but even more so if I had the choice of whether to attend. On the other hand, obviously I’m not going to use my limited vacation time (and many people don’t get vacation) to go down to jury duty. So now the pool of jurors has just become tiny, and for the accused, their jury may not represent a jury of their peers at all due to differences in age or economic status. The way this would have to work is for companies to use it as a “perk” of employment, where you get medical, dental, 2 weeks vacation, oh and you get jury duty. But, the everyday person isn’t going to view that as any kind of perk… maybe 200 years ago, but not today. I haven’t come to a conclusion on this one yet. Thanks for the thought provoking comments!

I was excused from jury duty today. I noticed the lawyer picking up on peoples’ body language and he would then ask follow-up questions to them. When he asked the general question if the decision was 11-1 and “you” were the one, would “you” stick to your convictions or deliberate and possibly change your vote. I cocked my head and grimaced. He picked up on me instantly…”what would you do?” I hesitated and said, “Deliberate.” But then I said ” to expedite the situation, I’d probably go with the majority.” The other lawyer questioned me to make sure that was indeed my position, and I was outta there. Buh Bye. Another lady kept reiterating a question like she didn’t understand, and she was gone too.

DISCLAIMER: The following is only my opinion and the use of any material is the full and total responsibility and liability of the reader.

I’d been studying our country and law for a while and watching the “dog and pony show” that passes for most of our courts. They are surely “shearing the sheeple”, mostly the “sheep” who can least afford to be “shorn” I’d already served on 2 juries and found myself called up for a 3rd. Now, I do believe that it is a “duty” to serve on a jury if called. ..But I decided to see what would happen if I told it like it really is.

As fate would have it, I was called and questioned. They asked me a few questions about what I did and I said that I was retired and now engaged in the reading and study of law. They asked if I knew anyone who would be involved in this trial and I pointed out the bailiffs and the defense attorney as I’d seen them in court before. They asked if I would have any problem conviction the defendant based upon the law involved. And I replied that I would not at all … as long as that law was “square” with the United States Constitution and the Constitution of the State of … They told me that was all and shortly thereafter that I was dismissed. And so I was the first dismissed. The next dismissed worked at the local law school.

I kind of figured it would work out that way. I watched another trial that lasted 5 days and anyone who could think critically or had any legal experience was dismissed. That trial and the court was a real travesty of justice where …. too much to go into here and was one of my first exposures to the level of corruption of the courts and throughout the legal system.
So it is easy to get out of jury duty once you are chosen to go through the selection process.

But if you want to use your jury-nullification process and be selected then you must be very careful what you say (but not lie). Exhibit behavior that would lead them to believe you to be of average (or slightly lower) intelligence (a bit slow), “uninteresting” and a bit lazy. Ask them to explain simple things but not too much.

“Jury nullification” is, currently, the final court for determining the “Constitutionality” of a law or its proper application.

Even the Supreme Court was never given that “power” by the Constitution but that power was “usurped” in 1803 by Chief Justice John Marshall when he rendered his decision on the case of Marbury verses Madison. The Supreme Court does not have the proper jurisdiction therefore no “power” to determine the Constitutionality of a thing and cannot determine or create its own jurisdiction as it does not have that “power”. Only the People have that power. The Constitution was created by the People. The Supreme Court was created by the Constitution itself and is, therefore, lower than the Constitution, therefore
inferior to the Constitution and so its jurisdiction is insufficient to judge the Constitutionality of any thing. Every ruling they have given regarding the Constitutionality of any law or act is not “valid” but a fraud.

A State as a geographical alone has no “rights”; a State as the collective of the “people” domiciled within that geographical area does have “rights”.

A “privilege” may be given to no one if that “privilege” interferes with, or infringes upon, the “right” or “rights” of an other. Any “tax” based upon ones “labor (sweat of ones brow)” violates ones “right” to the product of ones labors. Thus ALL “redistribution of the wealth” programs that use any funds that have been fraudulently extorted from the people via “Income Tax” or any other “rightful” source are “unlawful”. This also includes taking today by borrowing based upon future theft.

DISCLAIMER: The above is only my opinion and the use of any material is the full and total responsibility and liability of the reader..

Loss of confidence in the system is another excuse. The juror will be disengaged and the accused could get an appeal because they did not get a fair trial. This clip highlights the process in Australia and other systems which have an adversarial system. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHFa30pD3N8

Interesting theory that this is used by anarchists to dismantle government.

Only one problem. The government already knows how much power that juries have, and they don’t want them to have it.

So they try 99% of cases WITHOUT A JURY.

And on top of that, they have instituted administrative hearings, which take over civil and criminal courts. Administrative hearings do not use juries. And you have NO RIGHT WHATSOEVER to a jury in an administrative hearing. Constitutional, eh? NOT.

So instead of dismantling the government, the result is the government becoming MORE totalitarian.

DISCLAIMER: In am not an attorney (thank God) and have no “official” legal training so this is my opinion only and is not to be construed to be “legal” advice in any way, shape or form. It is up to the reader to verify for themselves all that is presented BEFORE any attempt to use it. The use of any thing or part of this is information in any way is completely and totally the responsibility of the reader and the reader fully accepts all liability for any and all attempts to use this information.

Most of these cases when they get to court are are actually “appeals” thought they are not presented to the defendant as such. You have the time (and responsibility) BEFORE the court appearance to work with you case and to “try to settle the matter” before it goes to court. This is time where most cases are won or lost, not in court but before you get to court. Papers NEED to be filed PROPERLY BEFORE you get to court. File a “challenge to the jurisdiction” of thecourt before you get to court. File a “notice of intent to appeal” before you get to court. File a notarized affidavit under oath with all of your case laid out point by point before you get to court. This ONLY gives you an idea of what kind of thinking is necessary and and idea of where to start your research to make you interface to the ILLEGAL system as ?pleasant? as possible.

Note: “Statutes” are not themselves “laws” and ALL “statutes” are NOT “law”. Legislators may think that they write the “law” and can write any thing they can get passed into “law” but they can not. What they actually write is the “statute” that stands behind the “law”. If a “statute” meets the “constitutional muster”, i.e., presents no conflict with or contradiction to both the United States Constitution and the State Constitution, THEN, and only then, is that “statute ” to be considered “law” otherwise such a statute possesses only the “color-of-law” and is NO “law” at all and one has NO “duty” to obey such a “statute”. Anyone trying to enforce “color-of-law” is operating outside of the “law” and is, therefore, an “outlaw” (by definition). If there is more than one involved in the act then we have an “outlaw gang”. Can anyone say: “Round up the posse, Boys!”?

Almost all of the problems we have in our Nation today are the result of the failure of the people to properly engage in their world. I must place myself in that category but am trying to remedy that malfeasance.

DISCLAIMER: In am not an attorney (thank God) and have no “official” legal training so this is my opinion only and is not to be construed to be “legal” advice in any way, shape or form. It is up to the reader to verify for themselves all that is presented BEFORE any attempt to use it. The use of any thing or part of this is information in any way is completely and totally the responsibility of the reader and the reader fully accepts all liability for any and all attempts to use this information.

I pay taxes so lazy scum bags can sit around and collect welfare and SSI. This year I’ll pay about $5k. I did my “civic duty”. Call those non-working slobs in for jury duty. I’ve got work to do and money to make so those idiots can buy cigarets and beer with their welfare check. Civic duty my ass.

Almost all of the problems we have in our Nation today are the result of the failure of the people to properly engage in their world. I must place myself in that category but am trying to remedy that malfeasance.

Actually, the reason people aren’t engaged is that they understand, on some level, that the system is a sham, and their efforts will be wasted. We don’t have a legitimate electoral system, because of the laws and rules imposing a two party oligopoly, and even those two parties’ freedom of association is violated by open primaries.

I agree.
That’s why I have always despised Southern Whites. They are the welfare and SSI bottom feeding parasites that our hard earned tax dollars go to. And it’s these Red-Neck lumps of dreck who lie about how Blacks & Hispanics are the ones sucking up all the benefits.

Try to wrap your head around the notion that the Executive Director of FIJA is a member of GNAP (Global Network of Anarchy and Peace).* To clarify, FIJA is a big monkey-wrench in the Anarchist toolbox. Dismantling the Government’s power one law at a time using their own rules against them… It’s poetic. It’s also much better than doing nothing which is what you do when you skip the opportunity…

Instead of trying to get out of jury duty please go to the Fully Informed Jury Association web site.

FIJA is a non-profit organization aiming to inform all Americans about their rights, powers and responsibilties when serving as trial jurors.

Jury nullification was intended by the United States’ founders as the people’s final check on the other branches of government. If you are called to serve on a jury, you are metaphorically stand in front of the government tank threatening the life, liberty, and livelihood of the defendant. Remember, your primary function as a juror is not to be an agent of the government dispensing punishment to the defendant. Rather your purpose in that role is to stand as the defendant’s buffer against tyrannical abuses of power by government. THIS is the information the government, lawyers and judges do not want US citizens to know.

“William Penn may have thought he had settled the matter. Arrested in 1670 for preaching Quakerism, Penn was brought to trial. Despite Penn’s admitting the charge, four of the 12 jurors voted to acquit. The judge sent the four to jail “without meat, drink, fire and tobacco” for failing to find Penn guilty. On appeal, however, the jurors’ action was upheld and the right of juries to judge both the law and the facts — to nullify the law if it chose — became part of British constitutional law.

It ultimately became part of American constitutional law as well, but you’d never know it listening to jury instructions today almost anywhere in the country. With only a few exceptions, juries are explicitly or implicitly told to worry only about the facts and let the judge decide the law. The right of jury nullification has become one of the legal system’s best kept secrets.”

* You did not actually read the article, but had a knee-jerk socialist reaction to it
* Public school produces poor reading comprehension in its subservient output
* You have some kind of really severe inability to comprehend irony

About

This site has its origins before the word “Blog” existed. Back then its owner, Kaz, was simply thought of as having a website that published socio-political articles with regularity…But the only real difference was that the RSS/XML protocals were not yet used this way.

The website was known as Site of the Sentient, a reference to the famous Words of the Sentient, that Kaz had been editing for years previously.

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